Here Are 5 Hot Cultural Trends That Marketers Need to Know for 2017

Post-election inclusivity, AI, 'tech drugs' and more

American elections have policy consequences, President Barack Obama famously said in 2008. With that in mind, Sparks & Honey's annual A to Z Culture Glossary argues that elections also have cultural consequences that marketers need to pay attention to in 2017 and beyond.

For instance, because cultural diversity was a big theme to the 2016 race for the White House, the Omnicom-owned agency predicts that "inclusive economy" will be a buzz term to understand. There was a strong anti-immigrant/xenophobic message during GOP nominee Donald Trump's march to victory this summer and fall, and marketers are going to have to decide what to do with that piece of information delivered by the voting public.

"There is white space for brands to step in and fill the gaps that are being left by the political system," said Terry Young, CEO of Sparks & Honey.

The marketplace, Young added, will be coming to grips with how emerging artificial intelligence and human morality can be balanced against each other. "It's probably going to be one of the biggest challenges organizations have over the next four or five years," he said. "How do you remove bias from AI? And how do we make sure it works at scale and does not do harm to society?"

Sparks & Honey's yearly list of prognostications is the culmination of two months of what the agency calls "cultural forensics," including cultural listening and predictive modeling via its proprietary cultural intelligence system.

Check out the five we found most intriguing, detailed by Young in the above video.